House Approves DTV Transition Delay

Get ready for a summertime DTV transition. The House on Wednesday approved a bill to move the DTV transition from February 17 to June 12, by a vote of 264 to 158.

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Get ready for a summertime DTV transition.

The House on Wednesday approved a bill to move the DTV transition from February 17 to June 12, by a vote of 264 to 158.

The Senate approved the measure last week, so it now moves to President Obama, who is expected to sign the bill into law.

Television broadcasters are federally mandated to switch from analog to digital signals in order to free up spectrum for public safety and other uses. The February 17 date was selected by Congress in 2005, but recent concerns about funding for the converter box coupon program, technical issues, and consumer education prompted President Obama's team to push for a delay.

In addition to moving the transition date to June 12, the bill also allows broadcast stations to make the switch earlier than that date if they are ready. If the stations do make that early switch, that spectrum can immediately be allocated to public safety officials.

Meanwhile, consumers with expired converter box coupons may apply for new replacement coupons. At the moment, people with expired coupons are out of luck.

The vote was preceded by a floor debate, during which Republicans criticized the Democrats for holding a "closed" vote that did not allow for amendments and for not having any hearings or markups on the bill.

"I'm trying to figure out what it is the majority fears about open debate," said Rep. Greg Walden, an Oregon Republican.

"This was discussed in Rules Committee the other day and there is a need for expediency here," responded Rep. Jared Polis, a Colorado Democrat.

Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, a Republican and ranking member on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, also questioned why the bill does not include any funding for the transition.

"The money for this bill is in the stimulus package, which probably won't clear the Senate for another couple weeks," Barton said. "We're delaying a hard date without additional money. How silly is that?"

The stimulus package, which passed the House and is currently being debated in the Senate, provides $650 million for the coupon program and outreach efforts.

Democrats were not swayed.

"Can you imagine February 18 when millions of households will have their televisions go dark and not understand why? Yes, it would be great if everybody had received their coupons and everyone understood the transition but they don't," said Rep. Maxine Waters, a California Democrat. "I don't care about whether or not amendments have not been heard. This bill had been debated ad nauseum in committee over time."

"This has not been an ideal transition and this is hardly a perfect solution, [but] punishing consumers is surely not the way we fix this problem," said Rep. Dennis Cardoza, also a California Democrat.

Barton provided details on some of the Republicans amendments that would have been offered had they been allowed, including one that would have removed the delay and simply authorized more money, one that would have exempted broadcasters from the delay if it was going to cost them more than $100,000, and one that said broadcasters would have to go ahead with the switch by February 17 if they were sitting on spectrum that could help provide broadband access to rural areas.

Barton still tried to push one change via a motion to recommit, which would have sent the bill back to committee, but that effort failed by a vote of 180 to 242. Under his plan, stations that are sitting on public safety spectrum would have to vacate by Feb. 17.

"Those stations that have spectrum that's going to be used by public safety officials and first responders have to relinquish that spectrum on Feb 17," Barton said of his motion. Stations that are adjacent to that spectrum would also have to make the switch.

The motion to recommit is "simply unnecessary," said Rep. Rick Boucher, a Virginia Democrat and chairman of the Energy and Commerce technology subcommittee. "There are very few public safety agencies that are even immediately prepared to start using that spectrum for advanced communication."

Republican Rep. Darrell Issa of California accused the Obama administration of being swayed by R. Gerald Salemme, the executive vice president for strategy, policy, and external affairs at Clearwire executive who recently joined the Obama team as a telecom advisor.

"It appears to me that the process was clearly tainted by someone who as an opportunist was trying to gain those extra four months," Issa said. President Obama, whose transition team pushed for the delay in early January, "was misled," Issa said.

Sprint and Clearwire completed their WiMAX deal in late November, but Clearwire chief executive Benjamin Wolff has said that the network build out might move more slowly than originally planned if the credit markets do not improve by early 2010.

Acting FCC chairman Michael Copps issued his support for a delay in a Tuesday letter to Barton and Rep. Cliff Stearns, a Florida Republican, who wrote to Copps on Monday in opposition of the delay.

"I believe that a short delay in the transition date will give us an opportunity  with adequate additional resources  to significantly improve the outcome for consumers," Copps wrote.

Stearns and Barton asked Copps to provide information about how many stations could switch to digital signals before the transition date without harmful interference.

Of the 1,749 full-power stations making the switch, the FCC has granted requests or received notification from 143 stations that have already shut down analog service. An additional 60 stations plan to make the switch before February 17, Copps wrote.

About 61 percent of all stations are currently operating on the same channels that they will be occupying after the transition and will, therefore, not run into interference issues, Copps said. Of those stations that will be switching channels post-transition, "most may be able to terminate analog operations prior the transition date without causing harmful interference to other stations," he wrote.

Copps acknowledged, however, that this data "says nothing bout the consumers' ability to receive those signals."

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The FCC will host a DTV transition hearing on Thursday. Witnesses scheduled to appear include representatives from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), Time Warner Cable, the National Association of Broadcasters, Consumers Union, the Consumer Electronics Association, among others.

Chloe Albanesius has been with PCMag.com since April 2007, most recently as Executive Editor for News and Features. Prior to that, she worked for a year covering financial IT on Wall Street for Incisive Media. From 2002 to 2005, Chloe covered technology policy for The National Journal's Technology Daily in Washington, DC. She has held internships at NBC's Meet the Press, washingtonpost.com, the Tate Gallery press office in London, Roll Call, and Congressional Quarterly. She graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism from American University...
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